The present invention is directed to an infusion pump having various power-saving modes of operation.
An infusion pump is used to automatically administer liquid medicant to a patient. The liquid medicant is supplied from a source of medicant and pumped into the patient via a catheter or other injection device. The manner in which the liquid is infused is controlled by the infusion pump, which may have various modes of infusion, such as a continuous mode in which the liquid medicant is continuously infused at a constant rate, or a ramp mode in which the rate of infusion gradually increases, then remains constant, and then gradually decreases.
Infusion pumps have been provided with features that save power during pump operation. For example, various methods of conserving power are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,529,401 to Leslie, et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,685,903 to Cable, et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,785,799 to Schoon, et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,838,860 to Groshong, et al., and U.S. Pat. No. 5,131,816 to Brown, et al. For example, the Brown, et al. patent discloses, at column 9, lines 55-60, that the microprocessor 110 which controls the infusion pump may be periodically awakened (each sixteenth of a second) by a wakeup timer 128, at which point the microprocessor 110 cycles through its control program.